Lambskin Condom Warning Law on AIDS Peril Backed

County officials tentatively approved a new law Tuesday described as the first in the nation to force merchants to warn customers that lambskin condoms provide less protection against AIDS than latex condoms.

“It seems almost unbelievable that no other jurisdiction has raised this as a public health issue,” said Vice Chairman Bill Wallace after a 5-0 vote by the Board of Supervisors.

Although the new law still requires a final vote, scheduled for June 11, it encountered no opposition Tuesday and is expected to pass.

It requires merchants to post 8 1/2-by-11-inch signs in English and Spanish that state: “Warning: Condoms may not be 100% safe. But latex condoms labeled for disease prevention provide greater protection against AIDS than do natural (lambskin) condoms.”

Failure to abide by the law, which is effective only in the 45% of Santa Barbara County that is unincorporated, calls for fines beginning at $100.

The county’s AIDS Task Force supports the ordinance, as do local AIDS activists. But county officials said the new law would not have been written were it not for a campaign by Santa Barbara businessman Jim Nissley.

Nissley, 38, said he was diagnosed as having AIDS in November even though he has practiced sex with condoms since he became sexually active in 1985. He said he can prove that he contracted the HIV viruses in 1986, a period when he used lambskin condoms exclusively.

“I have never had unsafe sex,” Nissley said in an interview. “Now, stopping the spread of AIDS is the most important thing in my life.”

Santa Barbara County officials said they have backed the warning because their medical experts have also concluded that lambskin condoms, which account for about one-third of sales, have a greater chance of leaking the AIDS virus than latex ones.

That finding is based on a 1987-88 study by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, officials said.

After the study, federal researchers were so concerned about the leakage of lambskin condoms that they asked manufacturers to warn customers that the virus could be spread while using lambskin products, FDA scientist Dr. Howard Cyr said Tuesday.

The warnings were never issued and the FDA did not press the issue, he said.

“We found that when we used both large viruses and small ones, they would leak through the natural membrane of condoms,” Cyr said. About half of the 48 lambskin condoms tested leaked viruses one-fifth the size of the AIDS virus, he said. Viruses about 50% larger than the AIDS virus leaked through the test condoms in two cases, he said. While the AIDS virus was not tested because of safety concerns, the findings led to the FDA’s request for warnings.

However, the FDA conclusions conflict with those of the Los Angeles-based Mariposa Foundation, which tested one brand of lambskin condom as part of a broad UCLA study of condoms in 1987.

The foundation discovered no leakage of the Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) from 25 lambskin condoms in a test designed to simulate stresses during sexual activity. The report concluded that concern about lambskin condoms “is open to question.”

Overall, the UCLA study found that of the thousands of condoms tested, only 0.66%--about one in every 200--failed by either allowing water or air to escape.

Acting on advice from Santa Barbara County medical officials, the supervisors declared Tuesday that “latex condoms labeled for disease prevention can prevent the passage of the AIDS, hepatitis and herpes viruses, but natural or lambskin condoms may not do this.”

Supervisor Mike Stoker, the new law’s principal backer on the board, said he supports it not only because of the comparative safety issues but because the public thinks that sex is 100% safe when condoms are used.

“I think most members of the community equate use of condoms with safe sex and have a false sense of security,” Stoker said. “They think they are protected from the AIDS virus, by both the natural membrane and latex, and the facts are that they are not.”